Three for All, or, Princes of the Universe
by TrenchcoatsAreSexy
Summary: The situation with the cartel becomes volatile, and Gale's return to the lab traps he, Jesse and Walt in a fight for their lives. Can they work together to escape?
1. Chapter 1

**Chapter One**

"I'm happy just to dance with you…" bounced out cheerily from Gale Boetticher's car radio.

He couldn't believe that after all this, there was this final insult, final embarrassment – he had to go back to the lab, plead with the man who had just fired him (and in favor of _who_? Some little punk kid! Of all the people!) – and ask for the key he'd left in his locker, the key to the same in his apartment – why had he even brought the damn thing with him to the lab in the first place?

He supposed he could get the locks changed on the safe, somehow, but… still, he'd have to come up with some excuse other than "Sorry, sir, I left the key in the meth lab I work in, must have slipped my mind."

Or maybe it wasn't about the key at all.

Maybe he was just looking for another reason to see Walter White again.

To plead his case, and maybe more.

_To tell him how I feel. _No, that was stupid. It was middle-school crap, boy-meets-girl ridiculousness that had no place in the world Gale was currently inhabiting.

But yet, there was still a part of him that wanted to do it. Maybe that had been the real reason behind the firing – maybe clear-headed Walter White didn't want feelings clouding his judgment, so he brought in someone who could only vaguely follow simple instructions, because seriously, what could this kid be other than a simple gofer? He couldn't possibly mean anything to Walt. It just wasn't possible.

Gale had to get back into the lab with Walt. There simply was no way around it. Not to mention that this was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. Maybe he was only thirty-four, but Gale wasn't getting any younger, and he had no desire to spend the rest of his life screwing around with departmental politics at some dinky private college when he could be working with the best – hell, he could be _becoming_ the best.

But only if he _fought_ for this. Only if he refused to let it slip through his fingers.

The problem was that confrontation had never been Gale's strong suit. He clammed up at adversity, rather than fight for what was his, or should be his.

Except this time. Because Walter White was his. Should _be_ his.

Oh, what was he saying? What was he thinking?

He pulled into the laundry's parking lot and sighed, resting his face in his hands a moment before shutting the car off and pulling his keys from the ignition. _Here goes nothing. _

He pressed down the lock with two fingers and reminded himself to look into getting a new car. One of those ones with a button you could press to open it, instead of having to fish around and pull out the right key.

Too bad they didn't make something like that for his apartment door, or, while he was harping on the subject, his safe. He was always losing his keys, always misplacing them, no matter whether he marked them with fancy little doo-dads on the end or put them on a keychain (not that he could ever find personalized ones with his name on them) or anything else he'd tried. He was just a scatterbrain – the only reason he could find his lab notes was because he left them on his table half the time.

He climbed out of the car and put his hands on his hips a moment, trying to focus on the single thought of _get what you want_.

_You want Walter White, then get him. Reach out and take it!_

But the thought seemed as ridiculous as it had a moment before.

What was he supposed to do, scrap with the kid for Walt's honor, like two guys in a bar-fight over a pretty girl who couldn't choose between them? What better way to just utterly humiliate himself than that?

No, Gale didn't fight. Had never been a fighter. A quiet, gentle-hearted boy he'd been.

He snorted at the description as it floated through his mind; it made him sound downright bucolic, and perhaps in a way, he was. But he found no pleasure in that, as if he were Little Bo Peep or something of the sort, too docile to stand up and shove Walt's new assistant away and _fight_, for the love of God, _fight_!

He entered the laundry and found the secret doorway already open; he wondered at it a moment but was too caught up in nervousness to dwell on it. He started down the red spiral staircase until, at the bottom of it, he found Walter White and his new assistant - Gale's replacement – bound and gagged and surrounded by armed men.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter Two**

Walter White cursed silently. Gale showing up, wasn't that just what they needed to make this situation even worse than it already was?

Walt could even handle being tied up, but having this piece of tape shoved in his mouth was way worse. He'd always taken pride in his ability to talk his way out of trouble, and this time, he was reduced to frantic murmuring that was probably completely unintelligible.

And Gale was still standing there, eyes wide like he was in _A Clockwork Orange_ or something.

And Jesse, God, Jesse – Walt's eyes darted over to meet his, and he could see the frantic terror there, without Walt to help talk him down.

_Damn this gag!_

He tried to express reassurance through his eyes to Jesse.

_We're going to get out of this, Jesse. I promise._

The men had burst through the door mid-cook. They'd been so quick that Walt hadn't even had time to consider a reaction before they'd each had two guns shoved in their faces and had been ordered to their knees.

There were five men in all, each dressed entirely in black, like some kind of James Bond death squad. It'd be laughable if it wasn't so terrifying.

But Walt's injured pride was screaming loud enough to mute out the terror. How _dare_ they come in here and hold him and his partner up? Did they know who he _worked_ for?

Then again, Walt was quite certain that who he worked for was exactly the reason that this was happening right now. Revenge by the cartel or some other nasty customer who has a business dispute with Gus.

_Next time,_ Walt snarked in his head, _Try a fucking conference call._

One of the men turned towards Gale and aimed his weapon at his heart.

Jesse burst into a frantic array of exclamation underneath the tape.

"What?" the gunman demanded. One of the men, who was standing closer to Jesse, reached over and yanked the tape from Jesse's mouth.

After a wounded cry, he yelled, "He's a cook – don't kill him – you need him alive – he's one of us!"

"I am!" Gale agreed, flustered and putting his hands up as if to try and protect his face. "I'm one of them – don't shoot – please." His voice was devoid of emotion, as if he had yet to fully understand that a trained killer had him a trigger's pull away from being completely wiped out of existence.

The men exchanged looks, before one nodded, and the gunman gestured to Gale.

"Knees."

* * *

"I'm so fucking tired of getting shoved into car trunks," Walt heard Jesse complain. It was pitch black, and the tape had been removed but Walt still couldn't quite breathe freely, or get around the sense of being suffocated. _Having lung cancer is probably not helping,_ he thought dryly. His comfort was not helped, as well, by the fact that he felt an uncomfortable pressure against his groin. Uncomfortable, but not exactly _bad_, and Walt didn't want to think about the implications of that realization any more than he had to.

Instead, he spoke up.

"Gale, can you move your hands? They appear to have landed on my crotch."

"It's not me," Gale called back. "I'm against somebody's knee."

"Uh, yeah, Mr. White. That's me." Walt felt Jesse wriggle to try and shift his position, which only served to increase the friction of Jesse's bound hands against him.

_Oh God, no, please._

"Mr. White, are you…?" Even against the panic, Jesse sounded more than a little amused.

"Shut up, Jesse."

Jesse's chuckled reached his ears.

"Hey, Gale, don't move your head up any or you'll end up giving me a blowjob."

Even in darkness and silence, Walt could sense Gale's disgust with the comment.

"Where do you think we're going?" Jesse asked a moment later.

"Mexico, I guess," Walt replied.

"Long ride," Gale piped up.

"Extremely long ride."

Jesse wriggled again, and Walt let out a semi-conscious groan.

"I'm trying to get comfortable."

"Well, don't. Save your energy for when we get out."

"What are we going to do?" Gale asked.

"I'll get back to you in a few hours."


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter Three

Jesse was going to kill them all. He really, truly was. If he had to stay in this godforsaken trunk one more second.

This had been happening way too much for Jesse's comfort recently. If he wasn't getting bound with duct tape by his ex-partner and his cousin, he was being held hostage by crazy-ass Tuco.

And now this. Jesse could barely breathe. Every breath seemed a herculean effort, and he couldn't even move. If it was only him, it might not have been so bad, but he could hear Mr. White's labored breathing and Gale's own attempts, and that made him have the not-quite-irrational worry that one or both of them would kick it and he'd spend the rest of the journey sandwiched between two corpses.

Eventually, the car stopped, after a buttload of false starts. Jesse didn't know what he'd do when the trunk opened this time… probably not lunge and try to attack whoever was there, given that that hadn't worked very well with Tuco.

So when the light streamed down on him, he simply slumped further into Mr. White – at least, he was pretty sure that was who he was lying on top of. A few moments later, a strong grip on his arm was pulling him out of the trunk and slamming him on the ground.

Beneath him was… sand. Or asphalt. Or sand on asphalt.

He didn't get time to figure it out before he heard Mr. White and Gale hit the sand next to him.

There was a long barrage of Spanish, before Gale mumbled to them, "He told us to get up slowly."

Jesse did so, as well as he could with his hands bound, that was. It was like trying to do the worm at one of his high school dances or something.

There was another series of instructions in Spanish, which Gale again translated.

"Uh, he said we're going to walk to a car. That if we struggle, we're dead."

Jesse began to really regret never paying attention in high school Spanish, other than the day everyone had decided to look up different expressions for masturbation. Somehow he suspected none of them were going to come up here.

Walking to the car bound was difficult. Walking to the car, bound, with a gun shoved against his temple was considerably more difficult. He began to wonder why he hadn't just rejected Mr. White's offer, partners or not.

Sure, one and a half million dollars seemed a totally sweet deal. But he'd have traded it in a second to wake up without having to wonder who might shoot at him today. He'd especially give it up in a second to wake up next to Jane, to tell her how much she meant to him and just how beautiful she was. To really ditch the heroin and start over in New Zealand, live in a nice little house and be anonymous.

But that option didn't exist any longer, and, frankly, Jesse's options in general were getting considerably more limited by the moment.

The car door opened, and Jesse was shoved inside roughly before one of the others (he turned his head and saw it was Mr. White) collided into his side and then Gale slumped into the last seat.

His vision was cut off, suddenly, by some kind of cloth. A blindfold. That was a good sign, at least – Jesse remembered from watching a crime show that a blindfold usually meant that they were planning to let the person live. Or was that if the person was wearing a mask?

_Same concept, right?_ Jesse thought desperately. We're all gonna live. _Please, let us all live. _

He didn't know how long the car ride lasted. The sensory deprivation messed with his head and he wanted nothing more than to call out, complain and hear Mr. White tell him to shut up. Anything, just to remind himself that he wasn't alone in this. But he had no way of knowing how close their captors were.

He had to find another way to pass the time. He started singing "round" songs in his head.

_Kookaburra sits on the old gum tree, merry, merry king of the bush is he…_

But wasn't that Australian or something? That got him thinking about Jane, about their plan for New Zealand, and that wasn't any good, any brighter.

_The head bone's connected to the neck bone, and the neck bone's connected to the…_

_Fuck._ He ought to have paid attention in Biology. Was the neck bone connected to the collarbone? Maybe, but that didn't seem like the next line. _What the fuck, anyway?_

The car stopped and Jesse heard a door open.

_There were ten in the bed and the little one said, roll over, roll over – so they all rolled over and one fell out, there were nine in the bed and the little one said –_

Jesse felt someone grab his arm hard, and he stumbled out, before someone undid the blindfold. He was standing in front of some kind of huge metal building, maybe a factory or warehouse.

"Where are we?" Jesse asked. Mr. White looked at him, his face projecting a kind of smug self-satisfaction.

"Must be our new place of employment."


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter Four

Gale was impressed. He hadn't wanted to be impressed, of course, because being impressed with one's captors' lab seemed to be on the general spectrum of Stockholm Syndrome, like complimenting the ropes someone has tied one up in, but it was at least a pretty large facility, from what he could see.

The men led he, Walt, and Jesse inside, and as soon as they did, Gale's awe decreased significantly. They had a nice set-up and all, and relatively advanced equipment, but the place was filthy. He could almost feel himself developing an intense case of OCD.

"This is your lab," the man who was "guiding" (more accurately, yanking along) Gale hissed. "And these are your chemists."

From the darkness, a number of men in lab coats emerged. All were bronze-skinned, broad-shouldered, and carried serious, almost bitter expressions.

Gale was really beginning to wish he had just stayed at home on this day. They – the ragtag team of the three of them, Gale, one genius, and whatever the hell Jesse was – were going to do _what_ exactly?

"Teach them." He saw a man nudge Walt with the butt of his gun. "Go on."

"Uh," Walt began. "Teach them _what_?"

Gale's gaze went over to Jesse, who was looking around as if he was trying to figure out an escape. Like he could run out of there and catch a bus or something.

It was obvious who was the brains of the operation, Gale thought, a little bit snarkily. Then again, those brains had just given a smart-ass response to a bunch of large men with guns, so maybe they were just all screwed.

Gale decided to speak up.

"You see," he began in Spanish. "We aren't quite used to working under these sort of – conditions. Please forgive my colleagues. They are tired due to the long trip. I am sure your boss will want them to relay back to Gustavo Fring that they have been well treated."

He flashed what he, for lack of a better term, pretty much considered "puppy dog eyes".

"After then," he continued quickly, "We would be glad – in fact, honored, to teach your men everything we know. However, we must coordinate. Each of us brings our own special skills to the table and we must," Gale paused, blanked, but only for a moment, "decide how we will proceed. We are used to only working with one another, you see."

Gale curled his hands together behind his back, considering this could go one of two ways – either they would accept his suggestion and they would all be able to buy themselves time, or the cartel would shoot them all dead.

He was really hoping it wasn't going to be the latter.

"Forgive us," the one man said in Spanish. Despite the snarl of his voice, he actually did sound vaguely sincere. "I will take your group to your quarters, and in a few hours. We will begin. As you will now be property of the cartel, we must be sure to keep you in good working order."

Gale turned to the others and translated the message.

Jesse's eyes went wide.

"Property? As in, like, slavery?"

"Sounds like it," Gale murmured. "Let's just all keep our heads down until we can figure out what to do."

Walt glared at him, like everyone should be taking direction from him as opposed to the other way around, though all he had done up to this point was scowl.

They got back in the car, and Gale was thankful just to not be pressed up against Jesse again. This time they were again able to actually sit on the seats; maybe somehow Gale's speech had led to them being treated more like guests than prisoners, in theory at least. Gale realized his backside was killing him, another reminder of the trunk.

But they would figure out a plan. He'd bought them time at least.

_Good thinking, Gale,_ he told himself, given that neither of the others were likely to say it.

Once they got back to an apartment, albeit with only one cramped room with a single bed for the three of them and with guards noticeably stationed outside the doors, Gale breathed a sigh of relief and lay down on the bed, which actually looked vaguely habitable considering the circumstances. But maybe that was Stockholm Syndrome again, so he checked that thought at the door.

"So." Jesse was the first to speak, and Gale's head jerked up at the sound of his voice. He had almost managed to forget that he was even in the room. "What's our plan?"

"Well," Gale replied, "If we're going to come up with one, now's the time."


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter Five**

If Walt had been in a more analytical mood, he'd have been examining the fact that he felt more resentful then relieved that Gale's quick talking had bought them a few hours to come up with their plan.

Walt wasn't in an analytical mood. He was in a generally vicious mood, too embittered to be properly afraid for his life – and, honestly, why bother? He was sure Jesse would take care of all of the shivering in fright for him. He always did, after all. Walt was the brains of the operation.

"We're completely fucked if we teach them the formula," Walt spat. "That's all they need us for. After that, we become expendable to them, and to Gus as well. We need to stall."

Jesse looked up from his spot on the bed, shifting and letting out a little hesitant sigh.

"What if we taught them how to cook, but kept it real vague?" he suggested, "Like, where they'd have to keep us around because they'd have questions?"

Walt scoffed at that, but Gale seemed to perk up.

"String them along," he pretty much echoed, and Walt rolled his eyes.

"You do know the cartel doesn't just hire chemists off the street, right?" he mocked. "This isn't your buddy Krazy-8, Jesse."

Jesse glared at him, and Walt felt irrational anger flood him. Stuck in another impossible predicament with Jesse! _Exactly_ the way he wanted to be spending his last days of life.

But that particular rant in his head gave him pause; maybe this _was_ how he wanted to spend his last days. He'd had fifty years of boring, predictable playing by the rules and it had succeeded in getting him nothing but a wife that didn't appreciate him and a family that barely noticed he was there, when they weren't thinking he was a spineless wimp.

Squaring off against the cartel _had_ to be a step up from that, didn't it?

"So we teach them how to cook the product," Jesse said, "Then just hope that Gus doesn't decide to eliminate us when we get back from, y'know, sleeping with the enemy."

Walt leaned forward, holding up his chin with his thumb as he thought. He needed a brilliant Walter White plan. Neither of these two were going to come up with one.

It had to be him.

"What if you taught them, Gale?" he suggested, "It'd be good enough product to keep them happy, but not identical to what we're making in the lab."

Gale nodded.

"Well of course," he gushed. "There's no way that I'd be able to pull off your formula _exactly_."

"Would they be able to tell?" Jesse asked. "I mean, they seem to not be guys to screw around with."

"We could explain away any discrepancies as… differences in equipment," Gale suggested. "Meanwhile, we work on, uh, an exit strategy. We have to get a message to Mr. Fring."

Walt snorted. Mr. Fring? How bucolic _was_ Gale, anyway?

"Yeah," he agreed, however, "Gus needs his chemists – at least one of us, or production stops. And if production stops… it's the end of Gus. He'll have to come get us." Walt smirked. They just needed to bide their time. He was priceless to Gus. The other two weren't, but he could pull them along. Keep them safe. It was what he'd done with Tuco ("He's my partner, I need him" – Walt barely suppressed a shiver).

He gazed over at Gale and felt a twinge of guilt as he realized that he was looking at him with big wide admiring eyes. So much of his life he'd wanted people to idolize him. He hadn't even been able to get his own son to look up to him. Now he had both Jesse and Gale falling over themselves to please him, and he felt it was more of a burden. Couldn't they just figure out their own shit without looking to him? He wanted to shake them loose.

But he couldn't. They needed him, and really, he needed them. He'd get them out of here, or he would die trying.


	6. Chapter 6

**Chapter Six**

Jesse's mind fluttered, a little like a butterfly that had been stripped of its wings. He was overwhelmed with memories, none of which he particularly wanted to touch on. He remembered how Tuco had beaten him, threatened him, and most of all that moment facing the sand, pleading with him, saying "I don't want to die…"

Again, he didn't want to die. Didn't want to waste away in this strange land. But at least Mr. White had a plan, or was at least pretending that he had one, which was certainly better than nothing.

The hotel room seemed way too hot all of a sudden. He grabbed his collar and tried to air himself out, gaining only annoyed looks from Mr. White and Gale as a response. Could Gale kiss Mr. White's ass just a little bit more? It seemed like he was trying to be his shadow on this whole damn trip, and Jesse was already irritated by it.

He wondered what the cartel would do when they finally came to get them. Jesse had seen way too many movies and could, unfortunately, come up with way too many possibilities. If they were going to start pulling fingernails or breaking knees, they could start with one of those other two assholes, because Jesse hadn't signed up for any of this. He should have just told Mr. White to get stuffed when he'd approached him at his house those months ago. Even jail would probably be preferable to whatever the hell was awaiting them.

His throat was chalky, and he mulled over all of his words before he finally spoke. But when he did, it didn't really sound any better.

"Uh, Mr. White? You got any ideas?"

Mr. White glared at him.

"I'm thinking, Jesse."

Jesse stuffed his hands into his lap and looked around the room, annoyed, but giving the older man a few more minutes.

"Well?"

"Yes, Jesse?" Mr. White hissed.

"You thought of anything good yet?"

He thought Mr. White was going to grab him by the neck when he stood up, and he slid his chair back preemptively.

"Perhaps, Jesse, I would be able to think of 'something good', as you so eloquently termed it, if you were to shut the fuck up."

"Hey!" Gale cut in, and Jesse rolled his eyes. "Arguing and bickering isn't going to get us out of here and home any quicker. You know, 'divide and conquer'? Seems like they're doing it pretty effectively to us, doesn't it?"

"Gale, let it go," Jesse murmured, "He does this all the time. This is the only way he knows how to operate. Just let him yell and he'll yell himself out and then things will get done."

"I think we'd probably get things done better if we all chipped in and had our ideas heard," Gale ventured.

Jesse buried his head in his hands. Gale really had selective hearing, didn't he? Mr. White didn't want to hear his ideas, he wanted to come up with all the ideas and then have the other two of them stare in awe at him. He probably also wanted them to pat him on the back and tell him how smart he was, but Jesse didn't have the effort. He just wanted to go home, smoke some weed, and go to bed.

In fact, Jesse wanted to do just about anything other than go cook for a bunch of cartel chemists and probably end up dead. Even going back to hang out with his parents seemed preferable to that…

"Why don't we just do what we said we were going to do," Mr. White hissed, "One of you two teach them. My money is on Gale because Jesse…" He just shook his head and Jesse rolled his eyes. Even in the middle of death-defying situations, hell, _especially_ in the middle of death-defying situations, Mr. White couldn't ever leave him alone.

Maybe that was how he stayed so calm, though. So above it all. Maybe he told himself that no matter how dour the situation might get, at the end of the day he could curl into his bed and tell himself that he was Mr. White, that he was smart, that he certainly was not dumb and unloved and pathetic like Jesse was.

But Jesse had to wonder how loved Mr. White was, too – if things were as bad with his family as they seemed, after all, had he lost the reason he was here in the first place?

He gazed over at Gale. On the topic of love, that seemed to be an issue, too; Gale obviously had hearts in his eyes for Mr. White. For the life of Jesse, he couldn't see why. Mr. White was just an angry old jerk, a smart one but really, nothing more, nothing less. He had saved Jesse's life and Jesse's owed him that but… he didn't know if there was something more to all of it than that. How could Gale moon over him so much without even really knowing the man? Jesse knew him, and Jesse knew that it was complicated. Really complicated.

Mr. White had an uncanny ability to be everything and nothing all at once, to be Jesse's savior at the same time as he was everything that Jesse wished he never had to see again. He knew that Mr. White would get them out of this, and just the same he knew there'd be something in it that would make him reaffirm one of those promises to never see the man again, the promise that he seemed so utterly unable to keep. So why, why the hell would Gale want that? Why would he ask for that?

A sharp knock and a barrage of Spanish cut Jesse out of his thoughts. He turned to Gale, feeling like someone had stuffed cotton in his ears and he could no longer hear a word but through the older man's intervention. He hated it; couldn't wait to be back in goddamned America where he at least sort of knew what was going on.

"They said…" Gale began, "They said they're ready, and if we're not… then we're dead men."


	7. Chapter 7

**Chapter Seven**

Gale had tried really hard to not be frightened. He had set every single neuron to that one difficult task. But he was having a system failure, and it had gone long past frightened into utterly terrified and scared shitless.

The cartel were going to kill all three of them, Gale just knew it. He wondered which one would be worst – being the first to go, or the last. Probably the last, to watch Walt – Walt! – die, and just have to sit there and watch it, never having told how he felt, never getting that chance.

Wait, did that mean, if they were going to die… he should tell him, right? But how? And wouldn't Walt say that this wasn't the time, that there were important problems going on?

His throat was dry as he tried to speak, as he tried to come up with a plan to save them all because someone had to, but wasn't that Walt's job? Wasn't Walt the one who kept saying that he had all the answers?

"Snap out of it, Gale," Walt hissed. Gale must have said some of it aloud, or maybe he was just shaking or something. He tried to snap out of it. He couldn't slow the group down. He had to do his part, other than just being the Spanish translator.

"Okay." Gale whispered the word. "What are we going to do, Walt? What are we going to do?"

"I swear to God, if both of you don't stop asking me that, I am going to strangle you both," Walt hissed. "We fake them out to stall for time. And then we…"

"Try and get in touch with Gus?" Jesse suggested.

"And put our fates in his hands?" Walt barked back at him. "You do know that he only needs one of us alive, right? And quite frankly, that one of us would be me."

"Thanks for taking a moment that we're most likely going to die in, and using it to be a complete dick," Jesse complained loudly.

"Listen. Both of you!" Gale declared, desperately trying to keep the arguing under control. "Maybe, once they bring us out… maybe then we can spot a weakness. Maybe we can figure something out. Right now, we're doing a lot of speculating and that isn't really helping very much."

"Jesse, I'm a little more concerned about my life than that I'm not being warm and fuzzy enough for you!" Walt yelled at Jesse.

"Suck a dick, Mr. White!"

"Okay, actually, exactly what I was…" Gale tried to cut in.

"Jesse, I swear to God if you get us all killed, I'm going to strangle you, you pathetic junkie!" Walt hissed.

"Yeah, okay, go ahead and…"

"WALT! JESSE!" Gale screamed. He had never screamed like that before in his life; nay, he had not even known it possibly to scream at that volume. He had always been a quiet sort of kid who had turned into a quiet sort of man. But without the volume, without the screaming, he knew that Walt and Jesse would not listen.

They whipped around. They were listening now.

"We don't have a shot if you fight. Honestly, right now, I'm not even sure if we have a shot if we all stick together. But if we work together, at least if we go down, we go down knowing we tried fighting them the right way. We can stall, sure we can stall, but when that all runs out, we need to know what our Plan B is. Walt… Jesse… got any of those up either of your sleeves?"

Walt looked between them for a long time; he looked almost offended at Gale's chastisement. At last, he spoke.

"What if we fought our way out?"

The other two men stared at him.

"Did you just say… now, I've gotta have wax in my ears or some shit, because it sounded as if you, Mr. White, you just suggested that we ought to fight our way out against a whole shitload of cartel and then escape into a country we know nothing about."

Walt's lips curled into a smirk.

"That's exactly what I just suggested." He looked around the hotel room, musing at something unknown.

"Have you completely lost your mind?" Jesse pressed.

"That's a possibility," Walt replied sarcastically. "But it's really our only chance. Both of you are going to have to fess up to the fact that if we sit here and wait for Gus to save us, two of us are going to die and the survivor is going to live out the rest of his days cooking meth for these cartel madmen. And I don't have that in my cards. I'm going home to my family."

"And give up cooking meth?" Jesse asked. Walt looked at him with an annoyed glance.

"Of course not, Jesse. I'm on top. I have to stay there."

Gale looked back and forth between the two. Walter was the best, this was true, but why wasn't he just eager to get back to this family that he apparently had waiting for him? Gale certainly wasn't thinking too far ahead as far as the lab went, so he didn't know how Walt could still be insistent upon it. Wasn't it time for those promises to themselves or to God or whoever might be listening that if they got out of this one alive, they'd change their ways and take the right path? That's what was caught on repeat in Gale's mind, at least.

"We're going to need to find weapons in here. We need to think outside the box," Walt stated, not even stopping to expand upon his thought.

Jesse rose. Gale thought that he was going to offer more protests, but instead the younger man's shoulders simply slumped, and Gale noticed a look of defeat crossing his face.

"Let's tear this place apart," Jesse said in a quiet voice. "There's got to be something here."


End file.
